F5 BigIP wants SMBIOS 32

[bhomrich]

I just transfered a 3-host farm to proxmox from ovirt, and am trying to get a F5 BigIP VE to run in the new Proxmox 8.2.2 environment.

I've been told that an error I'm receiving after the BigIP boots and attempts license registration was resolved in KVM-only environments with
telling the machine to use the 32 bit entry point in SMBIOS. (There is a bit of info that the BIGIP relies on apparently, and when it's retrieving it, it's empty)

args: -machine q35,smbios-entry-point-type=32

I found and added the args to the config file for my VM, but can't seem to get the machine to boot with it:

kvm: -machine=q35,smbios-entry-point-type=32: invalid option
TASK ERROR: start failed: QEMU exited with code 1

I've seen reference to a SMBIOS "section" in proxmox UI, but not much detail.

Is there a magic combination of configuration that will allow my VM to use the 32bit SMBIOS on the current UI/config files?

Thanks!

 

[leesteken]

args: -machine smbios-entry-point-type=32 seems to start fine, but I cannot really test whether it works for your case.
Why do you need the q35? Would it not be enough to set Machine to q35 in the GUI?
Have you tried -machine q35+pve0,smbios-entry-point-type=32 (which I based on the output of qm showcmd)?

 

[bhomrich]

The issue resolution discussed at F5 dev central had q35 in the args list. I’ll take a look at the showcmd output, thx for the pointer for the novice.

 

[leesteken]

The issue resolution discussed at F5 dev central had q35 in the args list. I’ll take a look at the showcmd output, thx for the pointer for the novice.

Proxmox uses -machine 'type=q35+pve0' when choosing q35 in the GUI, so try -machine q35+pve0,smbios-entry-point-type=32.

 

[gfngfn256]

AFAIK, if you set the machine version to 8.0 (in GUI; VM, Hardware, Machine, check Advanced, set Version to 8.0) then it uses the 32 bit entry-point by default. No need to go messing with args at all.

 

[bhomrich]

Thanks gfngfn256, setting that machine to use Version 8.0 did the trick, and the F5 booted and is past license management failures that happened before.

Appreciate the help.

 

[gfngfn256]

Good, seems like you are settled. Maybe tag prefix the thread-title with [SOLVED], (upper right hand corner under title).